Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle praised the Department of Energy’s advanced research arm for its support of promising new technologies, despite approving cuts just a week earlier and Trump-era talk of eliminating the agency.
Rep. Brandon Williams (R-N.Y.), chair of the House Science, Space and Technology Subcommittee on Energy, said during a hearing Tuesday that the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, has been “highly successful since its inception” and “has played a unique role in making advanced nuclear a reality.”
Ranking member Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) said its successes mean Congress “should be significantly increasing, not decreasing, its budget.”
Despite bipartisan commendations for ARPA-E — first created in 2009 to research high-risk, high-reward ways to generate, store and use energy that aren’t as viable in the private sector — the agency is staring down a smaller budget for the first time in 10 years.
